


heart beneath the skin (was it all in vain?)

by piggy09



Series: the unforsaken road [1]
Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Abuse, Gen, Probably going to be Jossed very fast, Spoilers for S1E10 actually, Spoilers for S2E1, Suicide mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-20
Updated: 2014-04-20
Packaged: 2018-01-20 02:21:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1493119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piggy09/pseuds/piggy09
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 1 OF SEASON 2]</p>
<p>Helena walks. Helena thinks. Helena bleeds.</p>
            </blockquote>





	heart beneath the skin (was it all in vain?)

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Polski available: [serce pod skórą (czy to wszystko na nic?)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1797607) by [olanaj](https://archiveofourown.org/users/olanaj/pseuds/olanaj)



> HELL YEAH 2.5 HOURS AFTER HELENA'S RESURRECTION I HAVE FANFIC FOR IT
> 
> *Note: this has officially been Jossed, since I spend most of this talking about the bullet in Helena's heart when Helena's heart is, in fact, on the other side. Unfortunately this forms the scaffolding of the fic and cannot be dismantled; pretend you have just finished Episode 1 and don't yet know that Helena is a mirror twin. Pretend a little.

It is a long walk. It gives her time to think.

—

Sarah had made a phone call – said _my daughter_ , said _live_. So. Kira is alive. Good.

Helena has a lot of blood on her hands. Right now, most of it is her own (there is a joke there, maybe, but not one Helena wants to even think about). If it was Kira’s blood Helena’s not sure she could keep walking forward, step after step after step, her boots dragging against the ground, the smell of her sister’s shirt floating around her head like a vision from God.

—

Sarah had made a phone call – said _I’m comin’ in_. So. Where is she going, Helena’s sister? Sarah is very fond of running. Where could she run to? What allies does she have?

There are Others, certainly, but Helena heard something in her sister’s voice that sounded a lot like how Sarah talked to _Helena_.

(She couldn’t tell what it was.

That’s because of the blood loss, maybe. Probably. Definitely.)

Not allies, then…what? What would make Sarah afraid, besides Helena herself?

Helena will figure it out, maybe, when the world stops spinning. She trails a hand against the wall of the alley she’s walking through, for strength.

She leaves a bright red smear of blood. It’s alright. Not like it’s hers anyways.

_—_

_I’ve already got a family I’ve already got a family I’ve already got a family I’ve already got a family I family I’ve already family got I’ve family I’ve family already family family family family family family family family family family family family family family family family family family family family_

—

She’s unarmed. This isn’t a good feeling – if someone tries to attack her she will collapse under their weight like someone far weaker. Like the house of cards Maggie had built, once, in a rare idle moment. Helena had not been delicate enough and it had fallen in on itself, the Ace of Hearts lying on top like a scolding.

The bright red blood of that heart!

_You’re nothing to me_ , Maggie had said, _just some_

Wait. No. That wasn’t what she had said at all.

Helena is unarmed and her thoughts lead in dizzy, stumbling patterns. Sarah keeps leaving her stumbling through back alleys. Sarah is terrible at finishing a job. Helena will put herself together: her Jack of Spades legs, her Two of Diamonds ribs.

Her Ace of Hearts.

Blood seeps through her sister’s shirt, and that is the biggest vulnerability of all: bigger than her empty hands, her empty pockets, her empty veins. She is bleeding through Sarah’s shirt, she is bleeding the bright red blood of her heart.

—

Sarah had made a phone call – said a lot of things, but what Helena remembers through the pain is that her voice shook. So. That is probably the fear of the person on the other side of the phone.

(Never mind that Helena knows fear the same way she knows pain, her two familiar friends, the only ones who have never left. Never mind that she knows how her sister sounds when she’s afraid – never mind that she has made her sister afraid – never mind that a part of her is hoping that her sister’s voice was shaking with _regret_. It wasn’t.

It wasn’t. Sarah said she didn’t want to make a family.

She was very clear on this issue.

It wasn’t regret, because if there is one thing Helena cannot afford at this point it is _hope_.)

Helena should stop thinking about this person, probably, but with her head spinning and her body one big heartbeat of pain she is finding it difficult to focus on anything else. Someone has made Sarah afraid. Someone has made Helena’s sister afraid. Someone besides _Helena_ has made Helena’s sister afraid.

It’s a lie that Helena is a heartbeat of pain. She is that, but her sister’s bullet nestled near her heart knocks the rhythm of its beat off, changes it to something like _mine. mine. mine_.

Helena wants her knife. Helena wants her gun. Helena wants this bullet out of her chest so she can find Sarah and hurt whoever is making her voice shake like that.

Helena _wants_. Helena wants to understand _why_ , because she’d told Sarah that she wouldn’t kill her and she’d thought that Sarah would understand. They have a connection, strong between the two of them, and Helena had thought that maybe Sarah would get it, get that killing her would unbalance the scales.

It’s alright. She has plenty of time to explain.

_Then again_ , she thinks as her breath stutters, chokes, _maybe not_.

_—_

_familyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamilyfamily_

—

The hospital shines something like              the end of a tunnel. It is all very bright and clean and Helena wants to cry at the scuff of her boots. Sarah would be ashamed of her, dirtying a place like this.

(Sarah is already ashamed of her. If Sarah saw her here she would finally, finally finish the job.)

Tomas would be ashamed of her too. Tomas _hated_ hospitals. Meddling-in-God’s-work. He liked stitching her back together with his own two hands, over and over and over and over and over and

Helena says _sorry_ to Tomas, _sorry_ to God, _sorry_ to Sarah. She is ashamed, a little bit, for living. Sarah would be ashamed of her for living, but Sarah is not here. So. Helena will carry the shame for the both of them.

She will keep living anyways, though. She’s selfish like that. Helena _wants_.

_—_

_Find Sarah. Kill Sarah. Embrace Sarah. Kill whoever is hurting Sarah. Find Kira. Never go after Kira again. Kill Kira. Kill Sarah. Resume your mission. Go after the others. Kill Sarah. Kill the next one. Kill Sarah. Kill the Proletheans. Kill Tomas. Kill yourself. Love Sarah. Kill Sarah. Love Sarah. Kill Sarah. Love Sarah kill Sarah love Sarah Kill Sarah lovesarahkillsarahlovesarahkillsarahlovesarahkillsarah_

_Ask Sarah_ why

—

She says _excuse me_ neatly like they taught her – _do not draw attention to yourself you are a knife you’re nothing to me be polite you are God’s messenger act like it kill Sarah act like it stop slouching Helena –_ but she thinks the effect is ruined a little by the blood on her mouth, the blood on her shirt. She wants to say: it is Sarah’s blood, too. She cannot quite manage it.

She says _my sister_ instead, because they should know, they should know that when they pull the bullet out of her chest that it has her sister’s fingerprints on it, that her sister’s fingerprints brushed, for a brief time, against her heart.

Helena can feel them, a little bit like Sarah’s arms around her. It is _louder_ , somehow, that touch. It beats with every beat of Helena’s heart. Helena’s heart jumps and scrapes like her boots against the ground, and then she is _on_ the ground.

The floor is cool against her body. It is nothing like an embrace.

—

(the light at)

(light)

( _youarethenightyoutwolightyouaretheandhowcantwofatesoriginalbesoI’vealreadylightgotdifferentthatpoorchildHelenawhathappenedtoyouHelenawhathappenedtoyouHelenathatpoorHelenapoorHelenaHelenaHelenaHelenayouarethelightoriginallightnightdaymonsterbitchwearingmytshirt_

_family_ )

—

She wakes. Sarah is at the edge of her bed.

_You’re nothing to me_ , she says, very calmly. She is holding a gun.

—

She wakes. Sarah is at the edge of her bed.

_I made a mistake,_ she says.

_I’m sorry,_ she says.

_I am dreaming_ , Helena says, and Sarah says _yes_.

—

She wakes. Sarah is at the edge of her bed.

Her hands are covered in blood.

_You were right,_ she says. Her voice is shaking. _The two of us, we’re the same_.

—

She wakes. Sarah is at the edge of her bed.

_Is this dream the truth,_ Helena asks.

_No,_ she says. _Not this time_.

—

She wakes.

She is alone.

The bullet against her heart is gone, and Helena is alone.

**Author's Note:**

> Where have you gone?  
> I'm like a rabbit down a hole  
> I'd cut my wings if I could only have control.  
> Was it all in vain? Was there a heart beneath the skin?  
> The truth remains, all you need is hope and you can make it.  
> Back to where you once belonged  
> The people that are holding on to everything they saw in you.  
> \--"The Reckoning," The Getaway Plan


End file.
